Portfolio

In order to find work/sell their product, the average (blank) writer needs:

For a TV writer:

2 specs of existing shows
2 pilots
1 manager
1 agent

For a screenwriter:

2 features
1 agent

For a novelist:

1-3 "trunked"/failed manuscripts
0-50 short story credits
1 sale-able manuscript
1 agent

For a playwright:

1 one-act/short play
1 play

Am I forgetting anything? Does anyone disagree? What does your To-Do list look like?

ALWAYS BE CLOSING, MOTHERF*CKER!

Tonight, I got very upset. My whole life this year has been about two sets of applications: getting a good spec together for the ABC/Disney fellowship, and getting a good story or two together for an MFA in fiction.

My first batch of MFA applications went out yesterday, and I sent a couple more today. By January 1st, every single part of the application process will be out of my hands, and the thought has sent me into a tailspin.

I always have a plan--ALWAYS. And usually B, C, D, and E plans besides. But now all of my eggs are in the "writing" basket--what happens if nobody likes how I write? What if I've been doing the wrong things this whole time? I cried and cried, and of course my boyfriend was there for me (like the amazing person he is)...

He said, "You're going to let a few people determine how you feel about your writing, and yourself? What makes their opinions so special?"

I said, "This is the entertainment industry I want to work in. It's all about opinion, and people *liking* stuff."

"So," he asked, "who didn't like your stuff?"

I came up with about fifteen people *total* who *maybe* hadn't liked my writing--the ABC people (apparently--I haven't heard a peep from them since I sent in my spec), and people from the few random places I've sent a few random pieces to over the years. But I realized--it wasn't that I was really getting hit with rejection right and left, but rather that I WASN'T SUBMITTING A GODDAMN THING!

So here I am, sniveling in the basement , and I realize: I'm setting myself up to fail.

If I don't like something of mine TOO much, I send it to about five places. Of course, I choose places that don't deal at all with things such as the piece I'm submitting. And so they write back notes like: we can't use this. Or: send us other work. And I trash that piece for good/stop sending *anything* for a very, very long time.

Meanwhile, I save the stuff I actually like, saying to myself: this is GOOD, but not PUBLISHABLE. Save it. Work on it some more. Needs more work, doesn't it?

WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING? This is called "fear of success" much as I try to dress it up as normal old fear of failure. Not to say that I *will* be successful if I send out pieces consistently and constantly, but that I'll then have at least a f*cking shot--something I don't have, btw, while crying about the masses of writing stuck on my hard drive and vowing to produce (and squirrel away) yet more.

So here I thought my New Year's Resolution should be about productivity and craft and blah blah, but now I think it will be:

SELL! SELL! SELL! ALWAYS BE CLOSING, MOTHERF*CKER!